1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to homeland defense. It is a deployable apparatus, where deployable means portable, mobile, expandable, configurable, self-propelled, or self-contained. This deployable apparatus uses multiple X-ray modules to neutralize known or suspected bio-terrorism attacks or biological contamination events in materials such as mail, clothing, uniforms, personal protective gear, and small arms weapons. The goal is to recover affected materials. Decontamination is performed at the site of the bio-terrorism attack or biological contamination event.
2. Description of Related Art
United States General Accounting Office Report #GAO-02-365 entitled “Diffuse Security Threats”, April 2002, is an excellent summary of related work-to-date concerning mail sanitation. This work demonstrates that ionizing radiation (electron beam or X-rays) is an effective way to decontaminate biological weapons, such as Anthrax, in mail. Ionizing radiation dosage ranges between 40-100 kGrays are effective. Flat letters require less exposure than boxes due to less penetration depth. For the convenience of the reader, from this point onward the term “mail” will be understood to include “mail, clothing, uniforms, personal protective gear, and small arms weapons”.
Both types of ionizing radiation have advantages and disadvantages. Electron beams have an advantage for high volume mail sanitation because energy is utilized efficiently. However, depth penetration is limited. So, electron beams are not well suited to large packages. X-rays penetrate deeper than electron beams, but energy utilization is only 0.5-3% as effective as electron beams. So, throughput for an X-ray process is lower than for an electron beam process at the same energy consumption.
Electron beam and X-ray generation are nearly 100 years old and well known. A technical description of operating principles is not deemed necessary in this application.
Problems exist for the present technology. Many such problems arise from the way the technology is being applied. Specifically, the direction of prior work has been to develop a method to sanitize all mail at fixed locations. Problems include:                paper products may be scorched. This is unacceptable if all mail is processed.        photographic films and electronic data storage devices may be compromised. Again, this is unacceptable if all mail is processed.        dosage penetration may be insufficient for large packages. Some dangerous biological species might survive.        a fixed facility invites the possibilities of biohazard escape and cross-contamination into other activities at that fixed facility. As presently conceived, there is no inherent protection against accidental anthrax release from a torn letter.        a fixed facility using high energy electron beams (up to 10 million electron volts) requires taking extreme radiation precautions, such as protective clothing, restricted zones, and 10-foot-thick concrete barrier walls.        facility availability becomes an issue when the facility has other uses.        handling of contaminated mail is excessive, which increases risks. Minimally, contaminated mail must be handled two times unnecessarily. The following three steps are an example. First, a delivery truck has to be loaded with contaminated mail and driven to the fixed decontamination facility. Second, the contaminated mail has to be unloaded at the decontamination facility. Third, the        contaminated mail has to be loaded onto the decontamination conveyor.        costs are likely prohibitive. Ten year cost estimates to sanitize all mail at fixed facilities range from $880 million to $4.2 billion.Without a revised scope of application, ionizing radiation for sanitation of mail is unlikely to be adopted by the United States Postal Service.        